Elgato has released EyeTV 2.5, a free update to its EyeTV 2 television software, which includes many new features for viewing on the Mac, the iPhone, and iPod touch. With Wi-Fi Access, recorded television shows can be accessed for playback from an iPhone and iPod touch in a local WiFi network.

Other new features include:

- Record from Live Buffer: The timeshift buffer contains the portion of a television show that lies in the past and has already been watched "live." EyeTV 2.5 can record this portion and store it as a complete recording.

- Float-on-top: EyeTV 2.5 features the option to have the playback window float in front of all other windows, always remaining the frontmost window, even in front of other applications. This applies to live television windows as well as recordings. The floating window can be moved and continuously resized, and even supports picture-in-picture functionality.

- IPTV Support for Freebox: EyeTV 2.5 adds support for watching live television streamed over the local network from the Freebox, an IPTV set-top box available in France.

Do have question about whether app has to convert every video twice to (1) prep for wireless sharing and (2) convert for iTunes/iPhone/iPod syncing. Will it take twice the time and twice the disk space? I guess I'll know in a little while. Lastly, I now want the El Gato USB accelerator. I guess that's the point, huh?

I'm going to update to this in a moment, but does anyone know already if it solves the problem of EyeTV locking the channel when a scheduled recording starts using a dual-tuner configuration (e.g. HDHomeRun)? This can be rather frustrating when relying on Remote Buddy as the primary input device. (EyeTV is supposed to be smart enough to look for available tuners when recording, as the display tuner is already in use.)_________________

EyeTV 2.5 update - Wow what a great one! The best bit and so far sorely missed is the retrospect recording feature. ANd another: I happened to plug in another USB receiver into my G5 and voila - EyeTV popped up another window - now I have dual watching/recording. I can even use the remote to drive the second (non-remote) unit. I'm absolutely amazed by this software. I haven't seen any other TV software (Mac & Wndows) that comes near EyeTV. Worth buying a Mac (mini) just for watching TV - beats ANY other dedicate settop box.

Just FYI, the minimum system requirements for PPC are correct (not a concern for Mini owners though). I have a near-stock Cube acting as a media machine in my living room, with an EyeTV 200 (Firewire) attached. With the stock processor (G4 at 450Mhz) EyeTV was a bit too choppy. I got a 533Mhz G4 module from a Digital Audio via eBay and modified it to run at 550Mhz on the Cube's 100Mhz bus, and EyeTV runs great!